Starting Your Own Business at Home

Im 20 years old. Tired of working 60 hrs a week for a company who couldnt care less about me. I want to be free of this, and start my own ethical business. I am a great computer technition. I want to open a computer repair shop, but i have bad personal credit, due to a few missed payments. What do you recommend for me to do, to get a business loan with my type of situation.

The following reply is by : Mac :
Dear Friend,

You have bad credit, so it is very difficult to take a loan may be other bank can help you. In this situation you friends or family members can also help you.

You can do one more thing to start your independent business. Just make contact with small business people like school administrator, collage administrators, coaching centers, computer hardware shops, computer software shops and small companies who use computers in their work and offer them your services in competitive price. work for them as a contract basis not time basis. Give them your contact number when they need you they can call you. In this way you start your business and grow you clientele without any investment.

I am overwhelmed with the choices of books available for people who are interested in starting a small business. I am also tired of books containing a lot of motivational fluff. Does anyone have any recommendations for a easy to use book that will give the facts to me straight?

I am planning on opening a coffee shop and I am very knowledgeable about the coffee business… but, I need something that will give me a guideline on the start to finish process.

The question was answered by :
GETaLIFE :
There isn’t one. But you are right about the books. I’ve yet to find one book on the subject that is actually helpful. They’re full of fluff, hype and some motivation. Big deal, right?!

Your best bet is dive in and learn it the hard way. You’ll take some hard knocks but it’s better than trying to follow one of those books you described. Besides, remember the old saying “Those you can… DO. Those who can’t…. TEACH”. Most of those books are written by failures in my opinion. Good luck! (Worth ten points?)

we have a small business and want to start excepting credit cards as payment but don't know where to start ?? do I call the bank or visa or master card ??

This is was answered by :
pooltamer :
You need a merchant service account. There are many companies out there that can provide this for you. I would search google for "merchant services" this should give you a lot of choices. Be careful though! The merchant service industry makes there money trying to confuse their clients. There are different rates for swiping a card or punching the numbers in manually. If a customer uses a reward card you are going to pay a higher rate. You MUST shop these rates against at least three companies. Good Luck!

I am doing research for an entrepreneurship class. I need to identify ideas and trends to start a successful business now and for the next few years. Any ideas or resources, statistics?

This is was answered by :
Andrew H :
There are a couple of ways to go about this. You can consider companies that would be on the forefront of developing new technologies (creation opportunities) such as renewable energy, robotics, etc. or bringing new and innovative products to market.

OR, you can look for existing market gaps (discovery opportunities) and try to fill them by combining two or more ideas or products already existing in the market. This tends to be more quickly successful as it fills a need (as opposed to trying to create a need.)

Hi
I was wondering if a teen 16 years of age can start business like the one mentioned above in Canada. I know in the States it's possible but I am not so sure about Canada.
Thanks for your answers
Rob

The answer is provided by :
scratch pad answers :
Absolutely, My PC repair Tech started 35 yrs ago, and as his children grew he had his daughter and younger son involved and today he is one of the most proficient Technician in Ottawa ont Canada, His girl was 15 when in high school and did her home work on a PC and her dad help her get along with mistakes, and started to show her the in and out of hard drives and software and now today he leaves her operate the entire Pc lab by her self and with employees under her staffing position and stil studing by correspondance to be a technical specialist. Hey Rob checkhim out at " nash@infotechpc.com , or www.infotechpc.com …